


For A Little Girl

by FBIEpidemic



Category: Lucifer (TV)
Genre: F/M, Protective Lucifer
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-09
Updated: 2018-09-14
Packaged: 2019-07-08 20:45:13
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 4
Words: 6,258
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15937952
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FBIEpidemic/pseuds/FBIEpidemic
Summary: Trixie is stricken blind and Lucifer will do anything to make it right once again





	1. Chapter 1

Her screams woke them. 

Brown eyes, that looked so much like Lucifer’s that people just assumed he was the father, are unseeing. She pleads with them. Her mother always eases her pain and Lucifer is her fighter, why can’t they take the darkness away? Why can’t they bring back her sight?

Lucifer seats in the front seat, driving like a maniac as Chloe attempts to soothe Trixie’s terrified cries. 

The doctors have no solution. 

She grips her mother’s hand as another needle pushes into her pink skin and draws another vile of blood. Another test, another inconclusive answer. 

She wants her Daddy and she doesn’t want Lucifer. 

What kind of King of Hell can’t just fix her sight? How can he possibly be some angel if he can’t do something as simple as that? 

He shares the same thought.

At night, when she sleeps, he comes to see her. He stands at the door, arms limp at his side and observes the way she curls in on herself. He can not bring her any comfort, only she can do that for herself. Chloe attempts to draw him closer. She wants him to come and hold Trixie. _”She’s just in shock, baby, you know that. She needs you.”_

He never does.

He throws himself into research. He’ll figure out what is happening to the little girl that he’s grown fond of. He hates himself for all of this weakness but what can he do? He’s never been stronger than his father. Never. And now, as he searches the books and relics of time he knows that this sickness cast over Trixie must his father’s doing.

“How can you be sure that it’s Father?” Amenadiel, as supportive as he tries to be, is never on Lucifer’s side. Even when it comes to fixing the little girl that they’re both fond of. 

Lucifer throws his hands up, he hasn’t slept. Trixie has been in the hospital for a week and he’s slept once. And even then it was because his now partial mortal body collapsed. That one had been fun to explain to the kid working the cash register at the Dollar General. Even better to explain then why he needed all of their supply of Monster.

“You can’t possibly be joking in this moment of distress. What about this doesn’t seem like Father? Something has to be wrong. Obviously, I have done-” he stops his rant and stands up from the floor, walking over the circle of books and pages he’d printed off the internet. “Mother.”

He made a shit deal. One he couldn’t uphold and now the youngest Decker is being punished because he can’t bring his mother back to hell. Well, so be it. She’ll go back. He’ll take her back and Father will have to fix Trixie. 

“Trixie asked for you today.” He holds the phone between his shoulder and ear. He’s sorting through his weapons. There has to be something here that can kill both him and his mother. “I haven’t seen you since Wednesday. Are you sure you’re okay? Not smoking too much or drinking away your feelings?”

He can sense the tone change, he’s adapting to the strangeness of human’s. But better than that, he’s adapting to Trixie and Chloe. It’s why he’s more than willing to die for them now. Anything for the two humans on this Earth that elicited the purest joy from his burnt soul.

But now he’s causing both his beloved Decker’s pain. There is distress in his lover’s voice. It’s his doing. 

“Lucifer,” Maze walks into the room, she’s got the drugs he asked for in her right hand and a final demand spiraling in her mind. 

He holds up a finger and indicates to the phone. She backs off, even she knows that she shouldn’t interfere with Lucifer and Chloe. Not with what’s going to happen tonight.

“I’m fine, love. I promise. I just…” he’s too invested to back out now. He knows what must be done. “I just love you, okay? So, will you promise me something?” Emotion is seeping into his voice and he knows now that vulnerability will always be his least favorite human qualm. Because it sucks. Oh, Father, it sucks.

He finds one of Maze’s knives and pricks it on his finger. Anxiety builds cold and unruly in his chest at the blood that flows over his finger.

“Of course. Are you okay, though?”

He hates to worry her like this. It’s unfair to hurt her like this. But what more does he have left? “I’m better than ever because of you but I need you to promise me that if anything were to happen to me that you’ll move on. You won’t be caught up in me.” The knife shimmers in his hand and he knows he must change his plan. He’ll himself and drag his mother with him. It’s what must be done.

“Lucifer, what’s going on? I can’t do that! What the hell?” Fear. Father, it’s seeping everywhere.

“Chloe,” there are tears in his eyes,” please. I’m begging you.”

She sniffles on the other end, he deserves to die. He should have never fallen in love with her. This is all his fault. “Okay. Just stop talking like this, okay? Come by the hospital tonight. I’m getting dinner at six so you can come to sit with Trix for an hour while I get it.”

He agrees. Sadly, just not for the reason, she wants. “Okay. I love you.”

He closes his eyes as he waits for her to respond,” I love you too.”

He stands haggard. His shoulders slumped and his breathing heavy as he fights tears threatening to consume him. “Have you brought what I asked for Mazikeen?”

The faithful demon approaches, the drugs in her bag weighing down her steps. They weigh down her heart. And here she’d come to think she didn’t have one. “Of course,” she hands them to her and their hands linger on the bag. She looks directly into his eyes,” but I need you to promise me something.”

His eyes are missing their spark,” I’m afraid I’m not quite in the mood for a deal, Mazikeen.” He takes the bag and looks over its content.

“Fight.” She demands arm crossed tight across her chest. She isn’t sure of the name but this feeling is taking her over. It’s what she felt as she held the paddles over Lucifer’s bare chest when he needed to get a cure for Chloe. It what she felt when he didn’t immediately come back. “Pinky promise that you’ll fight to come back.”

Lucifer looks confused and eyes her extended hand,” pinky promise?”

She nods,” the tiny human tells me it’s the most sacred form of bonding. It can not be undone.”

He nods, smiling faintly at the idea of Maze asking Trixie about it. The smile that must have eaten up the little girl’s face as they talked. How he’ll miss that gap-toothed smile. “Deal.” He wraps his finger around hers. “I pinky promise,” he corrects himself softly. 

He tucks the drugs into his pocket, they're to soothe the nerves he’s going to have about killing himself. But perhaps he might just be okay. 

“If you’ll excuse me, I have to go talk to the child. She’s expecting me.”

 

 

“Lucifer?”

She knows someone has entered the room. Her mother had just left with the promise that Lucifer would be by soon but that she had to leave if Trixie wanted food. It felt like her mother had left ages ago but now…

“Lucifer, if you’re there would you come in? Mommy left and I don’t like being alone.” She feels childish because she’s terrified of the dark. The darkness that has consumed her entire world but no one makes fun of her or says anything about it.

Maze tells her stories of the hellhounds that the demon says will protect her. Spins her these tales of the hounds' capabilities and how they have protected Lucifer in the past and how, because she’s technically the heir to the throne, they will intern protect her. 

Amenadiel told her that he’s just as much her Guardian Angel as he is her mother’s.

Her father promises to check under the bed and keep a night light on, even if she can’t see any of those things. 

But who she really wants is Lucifer. His domain is the dark and he always protects her.

“I’m here, child.”

She’s learned things in her week and the first was the importance of learning where people in a room and from the sound of it, she says Lucifer is at the foot of her bed. 

Maze likes to stand there.

“Mommy said you were coming. I’m sorry,” her unseeing eyes move along the room just around him. “I was mean to you. You left. I missed you.”

He looks away from her, biting his lip to keep his emotion at bay. This is so much harder than he thought it was going to be. “I missed you, as well, child.”

She smiles. 

Silence envelops the room. Lucifer’s mind wanders as he looks over the small child. He recalls holding her through her fights with colds. Standing the in the mist of a closed off bathroom as Chloe fights her way home. Bouncing up and down because she’s seven years old but comfort is comfort.

He remembers the face paints he keeps buying her because he loves how happy she gets when he sits still long enough to allow her to attack his face with the bright colors.

The nights where she sneaks into the bedroom and climbs up his side because she knows her mother will send her back to her bed but that he can’t tell her no. 

The pancakes, the chocolate cake, and the nights spent at the beach teaching her the names of the stars that she seems to love almost as much as him.

“Lucifer?” She seems hopeful, some idea coming to her brilliant little mind,” can I feel your face?” She’s quick to defend her question,” Mommy and Daddy let me do it. But… I want to feel your real face. Your devil face.”

He’s insecure about his devil face. How obscure and human of him too. 

“Are you sure?” He takes a tentative step towards her, he doesn’t want this to be the last memory she has with him. Yet, her face lights up and she nods eagerly. 

“Please.”

So he sits on her bed. He takes her hands and guides them to his face. 

They fall over his face, scratching at his facial hair and tracing his cheekbone. “I’m going to show you now.” She nods eagerly and so he lets his shimmer fall. She smiles. 

The unsmooth caverns in his face are not alarming to her but fascinating. She has so many bottled questions for him and if she’d know that today would be her last chance...

“Why are you crying, Lucifer?” Her tiny fingers can feel the hot wet streaks soaking his face. She wonders if she’d done something to upset him or if he’s like mommy and her sickness upsets him.

She feels him shakes his head,” I’m not crying child. You’re breath just smells so rancid-”

Her laughter cuts him off and he’s glad to have distracted her momentarily.

“Nuh-uh, Lucifer! You’re fibbing! Mommy made me brush my teeth this morning.” She smiles broadly in his direction,” I got toothpaste all over my mouth!”

He charms her with a smile and she matches it. Her fingers touch where his cheeks lift up and she tilts her head. “Why won’t you tell me why you’re sad?” She has this back feeling building up and if he doesn’t tell her soon she might just burst.

He can’t keep his face from falling because he can’t lie to her. “I’m going to get your sight back, Trixie.” 

Everything about that sentence is wrong. He doesn’t call her that. Spawn. Child. Little monster. He’s never called her by her name, not to her face. “How?”

He doesn’t answer and that’s all the answer she needs.

“Lucifer, you can’t-” she panicking now and reaches out to touch him but he’s not there.

She can feel her whole body trembling with fear. 

“What’s wrong, Monkey?”

 

 

Lucifer leans against the brick and inhales his cigarette. He can feel his heartbeat picking up, he’d taken all of the PCP. The irony is that fact that it’s angel dust and how far from an angel he is now. 

He shakes his hand, cursing at the burnt flesh. He’d let the cigarette get too small. Looking at his brunt index finger he sees her. Finger forgotten he ventures near her, Maze’s knife hanging loosely from his fingers. 

“Mother!” She stops in her track, high heel putting at the same height as him. It’s daunting to look into her eyes as he approaches. 

He reaches out, in a flash she sees Samiel her boy damned to disobey his father. That silly smile that always got him into trouble but she also sees the tears as he was dragged kicking and screaming from Heaven. The tears that streamed from his dark eyes. The hurt.

Now, his eyes are dim. Somber, his eyes fill with tears but she doesn’t mistake them for being anything like the ones he shed the day of The Fall.

His bottom lip trembles with emotion,” forgive me.” He plunges a knife into his chest, she hadn’t even seen it and gives a shout. 

In a flash, she knows what he’s done.

“Luc-”

He shakes his head, he’s falling.

Again.

To his knees, he collapses. She comes down with him. 

It happens faster than he thought it would. 

His chest heaves and tries to fight it, for only a moment. Then he calms. For Trixie. His last thought, his final prayer, the last thing he ever worries for is that little girl. Oh Father, damn him to hell but take her from the depths of darkness that You have cast her into.

 

 

When he draws his last breath Trixie’s world lights up. And she couldn’t have been more afraid. She screams out, hands going to her eyes to cover them. Not because it’s too much but because she wishes for it to go dark once again. 

“No!” Her sobs could wake the dead. “No!” She beats her fist into the bed and her mother has no idea what to do.

“Trixie!” Her room is filled with doctors, nurses, and everyone previously allowed in her room. Maze stands to the back of the room, broken to near sobs herself. 

“NO!” Her tiny body is wracked with the sobs and no one can soothe her. Not her father holding her down and hardly the drug they push through her IV. 

“Baby,” her mother holds her now. 

Trixie isn’t sure when she fell asleep but can remember too well why she fell asleep. 

“Baby, can you see me?” Her mother strokes her cheek and smiles hopeful but Trixie just averts her eyes.

She nods her head and closes her eyes.

“Oh God,” her father exclaims and he’s so damn happy but she can’t be. She knows what Lucifer did. 

“I wish it would go away,” she says, tears fogging up her vision. “I don’t want it. Tell God I don’t want it. Tell him to bring Lucifer back.” She looks up to her mother, begging. Hot tears fall down her cheek and she remembers the feeling of Lucifer’s hot tears on her fingers. “Bring him back, Mommy.”

Chloe shakes her head,” I don’t understand, Monkey.”

Maze pushes herself off of the wall, she’d stayed in that one spot for the entire hour that Trixie had been pulled under the spell of the heavy sedative. “Lucifer made a deal with his father in that warehouse. He had to take his mother back to hell. He didn’t so his bastard of a Father took Trixie’s sight. He would have killed her but…”

Trixie puts her hand on her mother’s shirt and begs once again,” so he’s dead, Mommy. So you have to pray and tell Lucifer’s dad that I don’t want to see. I want Lucifer. Tell him, Mommy. You gotta.”

Chloe nods her head, fear and so many emotions boiling inside her. “Is that why he called me?” She asks this to Maze, who can’t even look at her. “Is it, Mazikeen?”

The demon gives a small nod.

“Mommy,” Trixie begs.

But Chloe knows. 

There’s not a damn thing they can do.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Short update but there still another chapter to come!

There’s no body. 

No trace of the Devil that sauntered into their lives and left with the biggest theoretical bang that they never thought possible.

Was it worth it? Sight for a life? 

“It’s not as simple as that,” Maze reveals soberly, she’s leaning against kitchen counter now. Turns out, all is good now. No need for any doctors if there isn’t anything physically wrong. “This kind of thing has happened before.” 

There’s a moment where they all stop and glance at Trixie. She’s seating on the living room floor wrapped up in the blanket that Lucifer got her for Christmas just staring at the pictures of their family. 

“His Father has done this before.” Maze can’t meet any of their eyes. “It starts off with blindness. Escalates to a fever, paranoia, seizures until…” She shakes her head,” it’s always for a different reason but this is the first time he was able to stop it.” 

Maze looks to the floor. Many humans had perished at Lucifer’s inability to appease his father. But maybe not because he couldn’t but because he’d never felt as compelled. “I don’t think it was because he couldn’t stop it but because he just refused but this time…” Maze trails off.

Trixie enters the room and all eyes go to the little girl and try to stop thinking about sacrifice Lucifer was willing and did to make for the little girl before them. “Mommy?” She walks into her mother’s legs and leans there. “Will you make me an omelet?”

As much as it bothers both her mother and father that all she is willing to eat is eggs, they’re just glad she’s eating something. They were warned by Linda that Trixie might stop eating altogether. So far, she’d gone through the stages of grief like a champ and they’re all still waiting for the other shoe to drop.

It’ll drop but for now, they won’t get upset about the nights she spends sleeping in their beds, the nightmares, the number of eggs they have to buy, or no being able to wash the blanket she’s been wrapped up in for a week.

“Course, Monkey.” Chloe glances at Dan but untangles her legs from her daughter's arms. 

Not sulking so much as entrapped in her own mind, Trixie walks back to her bedroom. 

She crawls under her bed and cradles the box of glow in the dark stars to her chest. Lucifer got them for her. He was going to put them on her ceiling but she lost them. He wasn’t mad simply put off that he had to go digging around to find them.

She had found them after she got home from the hospital. Her mother and Maze were in the kitchen trying to conjure up some food for her to eat but she wasn’t bothered with food at the time. She had wiped her leaky nose on her sleeve and spotted the faint green glow. She lifted the bottom of her bedspread and there were the stars.

“Trixie!”

She curls around the box and fingers the box. 

He was so thrilled when she started to show interested in the stars. He would take her out to the beach and put her on his shoulders. Together, they would point out stars and constellations. Stars are what brought them closer, more than just ‘Spawn’ and ‘Devil’.

“Trixie?” Her bedroom cracks open and she can hear her father walk in and lift up her blanket, peeking under the covers. “Come on, baby. You mom made an omelet and Maze put on Hercules.”

She shakes her head,” I don’t want to watch that.”

Dan is confused,” Trix, that’s your favorite movie.”

She shakes her head,” I just don’t want to watch it.”

It was the family movie. For the nights when her dad came over and they would all squeeze onto the couch meant for two people not a demon, the Devil, and two grown adults. They would laugh when Hades came on the screen, Lucifer would shake his head and try to explain that he and Hades have nothing in common except for the fact that no one really understands them. No one dared say much about Maze though. 

“Okay. Well, I’ll turn your light out, okay? I’ll leave your night light on and your mom will be in soon, okay?” Her dad pats her leg and leaves with nothing else.

She feels just a tad bit guilty for not eating the omelet her mother made. No one else will probably eat it either. Lucifer would-

There is a thump outside her window. She’d heard something like it in the spring when the baby birds were being pushed out of the nest. Except now it’s fall and there should be no babies. 

She ventures to the window. Before she would have been frightened by the aspect of noises coming from the dark but she no longer fears the dark. What can possibly be in the dark that can be as painful as losing someone you love?

She opens the window, pushing it open easily because she keeps forgetting her mother warning her to lock it. But when you live with the Devil... or when you used to. 

In the dark, someone rises. Darker than the night sky she can see it’s a man, wings limp at his side. He stumbles, half crouched in on himself but he comes closer to her window. There’s a low rumble of a voice but he’s too far away to hear. 

A light breeze wafts a familiar scent through the open window. 

She doesn’t need to see the face to know who it is. 

The man stops, still in the dark but close enough now to see the blood that glints off of his shirt. “Little one?”


	3. Chapter 3

_”Little one?”_

Chloe Decker sits all alone in a bed that once was made for two. She’d known, since the day she meet Lucifer, that their partnership was odd and he held that true even with his dying breath.

She pulls the covers over her body, wondering what it will be like to have to get used to having to sleep alone again. She yearns to hear his chuckle carry out from the bathroom. To feel him press against her back and his hot breath on the back of her neck. 

Instead, she’s cold and alone in a bed that’s far too large for her alone and a pregnancy test cast aside on the bathroom floor. She doesn’t want to know what it says. 

Damned if she does, damned if she doesn’t.

Did he go back to hell?

She almost hopes that he did. He wouldn’t want to go to Heaven but she knows the physical pain that he feels going down there. Cast down there time and time again when he’s meant to be out in the world shining like the rest of his siblings. 

No one can understand that. Not even her.

Certainly, not his father. 

Lucifer always took mock offense when he was compared to Hades. He would point out that he’d meet the man and they had almost nothing in common. Chloe couldn’t disagree more, especially now. Two tortured, powerful beings cast out of their heavens because they just weren’t as optimal as the others. Burning hatred cooled by a soul too good to be true, who fell in love with the rebellious princess. Yeah, she can see it.

“Mommy?”

She seats up in her bed, turning away from the window that she’d been staring out, somberly. “Yeah, Monkey?” She can’t really see her daughter in the dark. 

She hears a sniffling, little feet dragging across the floor and then a cold hand against her leg. “Mommy, I need you to go outside. Lucifer is all wet, he can’t come in alone.”

It’s hard to understand her, Chloe’s not really paying attention. It’s just that she heard Lucifer and now she’s got this hope that burning in her chest and clouding her breath with doubt. “Baby, Lucifer-”

“He’s really outside. I didn’t think it was him either but it really, really is!” Trixie reaches out and grabs her hand, desperation bright in her tiny eyes. “We need your help.”

Chloe feels stuck in turmoil. She shouldn’t allow this kind of imagination-rich storytelling but Lucifer’s done a lot of things throughout the years so… “Okay, well show me where he is.”

She’s not really expecting much. Maybe she’ll end up cramped up in Trixie’s tiny bed. She’ll have to take a few trips around the house. It’s a constant reassurance to herself and Trixie that the Devil that they had grown used to is dead. Gone.

She allows Trixie to pull her out to the living room. Doesn’t say a word when Trixie slides on her flip-flops and hands her an umbrella. “We’re gonna need like seven band-aids,” Trixie informs her with a positive nod and pushes their door open.

The night is cold. The rain has caused the temperature to drop oddly. It makes her yearn for her Devil even more. Like a personal furnace, his body was always warm and a comfort to have in moments like this. She’s alone though and she needs to get used to that.

“Trix-” Chloe tries to reach out for her daughter. She can see the dark spot of a human body on the ground a few feet away. It doesn't look like Lucifer, not from here but she’s never seen him on the ground in a heap.

Her daughter just tears off. As fast as her little feet can carry her. 

“Lucifer!” Chloe watches her daughter fall to her knees beside the person and she can faintly hear the mass say something. It’s in a deep voice that even from feet away, over the sound of the rain, she’s positive she knows it.

She draws closer, adamant and just refusing to believe what this could be.

“-her? Get the ‘tective?” 

She stands still. The branches of some tropical tree looms over them. Underneath the thick limbs, the rain falls less frequently in fat drops. More importantly, the man that her daughter is cradling. Her tiny hands on both sides of his beaten face and a toothy grin looking up at her mother. 

It’s Lucifer, undeniable.

“Detective.” He breathes a sigh of relief and leans back into Trixie’s lap. His eyes fall shut as if her presence was the only thing he was holding on to. Somehow, she thinks it’s plausible to think just that.

It’s not Chloe that is there for the next few minutes. Chloe is a sobbing mess who wants to hold the man she loves until she falls into a fitful sleep. The detective, the brave, smart part of her knows what to do. At that moment, the detective is needed.

“No. Lucifer open your eyes,” she pulls her hands his body. Up his tattered shirt, over his legs and a quick brush over the wings that he probably doesn’t even realize are out. “What happened?”

Dark eyes flutter open and stare into the nothing of the branches above their heads. “The Devil got kicked out of hell.” There is no playful smile, no mischief in his eyes. He’s lost. 

She almost doesn’t think anything of it but makes a small mental note to say something later.

“Cou-” his entire body leaves the ground as he coughs. Dark, frothy blood falls from his mouth and he spits it away. Not even Trixie says anything about it. 

“Shh,” it’s obviously better just to have him be silent. “It’s okay. Can you stand? We need to get you inside.” She doesn’t think anything of it but her hand is on his chest. 

Before the sickness, they had begun this odd relationship. He really did live with them but they were more than just boyfriend and girlfriend. He’d died for her, twice now. They are so much more than words can describe right now.

He looks lazily at her and gives a slow nod,” have to, don’t I?”

How could she ever be mad at him? When he’s so childishly happy and in need, he’s undeniable.

She nods grimly and bends over his wounded body to press a hot kiss to his overly warm forehead. “I’m sorry, I can’t do it alone.”

Getting him to his feet almost woke the neighbors. With an arm around her shoulders and an arm on Trixie’s just for the sake of appeasing the child, they hobble as well as they can. His ribs have to be crushed with the amount of pain that they radiate. 

Chloe pretends she doesn’t hear his muffled sobs that tear through his throat as he hides his face. 

They have to stop at the porch. 

He’s hardly breathing as pale as a ghost.

“Maybe we should call the hospital.”

He gives a small shake and mumbles,” angel blood.”

His frame wracks as another round of coughing has his breathing sounding more like the kazoos that Chloe gave out at Trixie’s last birthday.

They give him a much needed moment. 

Chloe calls Maze, Amenadiel, and Linda. 

As she watches him almost fall asleep slumped against their porch, she decides Ella too. They’ll need the young woman’s hope.

“It’s okay, Lucifer.” Chloe watches her daughter get as close as she can to the fallen angel. He wraps a sluggish arm around her. Both shivering at physical exertion and chill of the air. 

Tears swell in her eyes as she watches Lucifer winces to move so that he can press a kiss to Trixie’s hairline,” all because of you, little one. You saved me.”

Trixie looks up at him, rain glistening in her hair,” you saved me first.”

He shakes his head, lazy and slow,” how wrong you are, my child. You saved me long before I knew I needed it.” Then he looks to Chloe,” both of you.”


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You guys are so sweet. I love reading your comments. 
> 
> This Chapter is kinda shit but it's okay, I'll probably update again soon... as long as the hurricane doesn't get me first

_His thoughts were of the spawn. That silly smile that she often wears when she crashes into his legs. Even after all this time, a couple months now, that he’s practically lived with them and she’s still as happy as ever so see him every morning._

_For some reason, he felt nothing. As soon as the knife plunged into his flesh he was nothing but numb. Some inkling of thought pointed him to his father. When he ascended, he knew it was his father’s doing. An apology, if you will._

_His eyes cracked upon and he was… let down by what he saw but not surprised. Something, dark and hopeful, in him, had hoped he would wake in his bed. Chloe would be cuddled into his side and Trixie's pointy fingers would be poking his cheeks. The little girl would be whispering his name, sleepy eyes wide awake with the hope that he might make them pancakes or omelets. Some bridge in Hell just doesn't have the same effect._

_Especially, when he can feel the sharp jab of someone's fist holding his head up. He had had some pretty kinky sex, hair pulling in that mix but it had never hurt this bad. Not even that time the guy pulled Lucifer's body back using his hair so that he jab his hips harder into him. Actually, recalling back to that night hair pulling was hot as fuck and he'd totally sleep with that guy again._

_“Brother.” Michael, whom he saw last standing at the edge of Heaven watching him fall, stands in front of him. His body is blurry and out of fucos but there is only ever been one other angel with the same features as he wears. "You never learn, do you?”_

_He’s stricken. Someone behind him kicks his back and for a moment he can’t breathe. The hands in his hair get tighter and the foot comes in again. If it weren't for the fingers stratching at his scalp he'd be in a pool of bones on the ground._

_When his vision clears and some of the heat leaves his torso, he can see Michael shaking his head. “Father sent me here to greet you. To tell you that he was proud because you finally put your own selfish needs after someone else’s but…” Michael motions to everything around him,” then I got caught up in the actual hell that you made my angelhood.”_

_The magnitude of pain that rains down on him, his mind was never clear enough to surmount or think past. Hands, legs, feet. It felt as if an army of men were upon him, beating and kicking at every square inch of his body and there probably were._

_The only thing that keeps him from slipping again, is one simple question. If he dies in hell, where does he go? Is this his purgatory? Will he ever be able to return to his detective?_

_”Brother,” Michael is now holding his head up but Lucifer can’t really see his brother. “You will not come back here. You are to walk Earth until you die and then you shall be cast into the nothing like the demons you walked so trusting by.”_

_This behavior is odd for Michael. Always such the little soldier and that was what made him such an easy person to taunt. Lucifer wonders what’s happening in hell to make his twin so angered. So disobedient._

_”You will go back to your detective, as Father instructed.” His hair is released and his body sags down. Michael scoffs at his brother’s broken body. “I wish to never see you again, Samiel. I wish you damndest.”_

_Lucifer had traveled between the plans before but being sucked from Hell and thrown to Earth while injured…. He’d never vomited before but now he can add that to his list of human experiences._

But then there was the child.

_”You saved me long before I knew I needed it. Both of you._

He recognizes the humming of the space he’s in. The swirling overly sweet scent of cherries. The light snoring coming from somewhere beside him. He knows this place.

He opens his eyes much against their protest. Heavy and deathly he looks up at the ceiling. This is not Hell. 

Hell is thick with smoke. The first week of Hell is learning to breathe in that atmosphere where the air is thick and still and unmoving. There is no Hellstorms, which would be the only reason that Hell is making any noise besides the shouts of pain of those being tortured.

This is not Hell.

“Hold still, big guy.” 

Dan.

The man moves somewhere in Lucifer’s line of vision. His head so clouded he can’t come to think of anything besides,” vime.” 

Dan moves over him and peers down,” listen, buddy, I took some Spanish in high and my Nana used to yell at me in Spanish so I’m kinda limited with languages here.”

Lucifer feels his body cool, whatever Hell fever had overtaken him is gone. “Dummkopf.”

Dan just shook his head and left the room. He recalled the words and restated them for Maze. She just shook her head,” I can hardly see how ‘wrath’ in Enochian and ‘idiot’ in German are detrimental to his health.”

She stands with her hands crossed and scowls at him. 

Luckily, there’s at least one of them that can defuse the demon. “Maze, we should be focused on the silver lining here. Lucifer woke up! He’s speaking, not in English, but he’s making clear sentences.”

Chloe, who has remained at her spot on the sofa staring into space, stands,” I’m gonna go sit with him.” 

Guilty. She should have been there with him. He should have woken up with her by his side not Dan poking around their messy IV line and homemade medical charts. But she’ll be there next time.

She's there sometime later when the pen they had been using stopped working.

“Did you try liking the tip?”

“What a stupendous idea, detective.” His comment would have blown over with far better grace if he hadn’t begun to cough wetly and painfully over the word ‘stupendous’. The coughing jars his ribs in a way that the still broken bones find very displeasing. He hadn't even been awake that long. Just simply rolled into consciousness to hear Chloe's voice. Now he's gasping for air that won't expand his lungs. 

“Breathe.” He isn’t drawing any air into his lungs. He just reminds curled onto his side, oblivious to everything besides the blistering heat across his chest. “Lucifer,” he can almost hear the panic in Chloe’s voice or the hand on his back trying to usher him back to her. “Lucifer, if you don’t start breathing, we’re going to have to take you to the hospital.”

He means to disagree. But he finds his mouth wet and coppery. 

She puts a hot warm hand on his back and he feels his nerve settle. He calms.

And for the first time in a month, things might actually be looking up.


End file.
